Matins

Matins (also Mattins) is a canonical hour in Christian liturgy, originally sung during the darkness of early morning (between midnight and dawn).

The earliest use of the term was in reference to the canonical hour, also called the vigil, which was originally celebrated by monks from about two hours after midnight to, at latest, the dawn, the time for the canonical hour of Lauds (a practice still followed in certain orders). It was divided into two or (on Sundays) three nocturns. Outside of monasteries, it was generally recited at other times of the day, often in conjunction with lauds.

Liturgy

In the Liturgy of the Hours of the Latin Church, Matins is also called “the Office of Readings”, which includes several psalms, a chapter of a book of Scripture (assigned according to the liturgical seasons), and a reading from the works of patristic authors or saints.

In the Byzantine Rite, these vigils correspond to the aggregate comprising the Midnight office, orthros, and the first hour.

Lutherans preserve recognizably traditional Matins, distinct from the office of morning prayer.

In the Anglican Daily Office, Matins, occasionally spelled Mattins, combines the hours of Matins and Lauds as established by St. Benedict in Roman Catholicism and observed in England until the Reformation, most grandly in the Sarum Rite. It is one of the two daily times for prayer, the other being Evensong, which combines St. Benedict's Vespers and Compline.

In Oriental Orthodox Christianity and Oriental Protestant Christianity, the office is prayed at 6 am, being known as Sapro in the Syriac and Indian traditions; it is prayed facing the eastward direction of prayer by all members in these denominations, both clergy and laity, being one of the seven fixed prayer times.

"Matins" is sometimes used in other Protestant denominations to describe any morning service.

History

From the time of the early Church, the practice of seven fixed prayer times has been taught; in Apostolic Tradition, Hippolytus instructed Christians to pray seven times a day "on rising, at the lighting of the evening lamp, at bedtime, at midnight" and "the third, sixth and ninth hours of the day, being hours associated with Christ's Passion." With respect to praying in the early morning, Hippolytus wrote: "Likewise, at the hour of the cock-crow, rise and pray.

Because at this hour, with the cock-crow, the children of Israel refused Christ, who we know through faith, hoping daily in the hope of eternal light in the resurrection of the dead."

Catholic Church

Roman Rite

Vigil

The every-night monastic canonical hour that later became known as matins was at first called a vigil, from Latin vigilia. For soldiers, this word meant a three-hour period of being on the watch during the night. Even for civilians, night was commonly spoken of as divided into four such watches: the Gospels use the term when recounting how, at about "the fourth watch of the night", Jesus came to his disciples who in their boat were struggling to make headway against the wind, and one of the Psalms says to the Lord: "A thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past, or as a watch in the night."

The sixth-century Rule of Saint Benedict uses the term vigiliae ("vigils") fifteen times to speak of these celebrations, accompanying it four times with the adjective nocturnae ("nocturnal") and once with the words septem noctium ("of the seven nights", i.e., the nights of the week).

English versions of this document often obscure its use of the term vigil, translating it as "Night Hour" or "Night Office". Thus Leonard J. Doyle's English version uses "Night Office" to represent indifferently the unaccompanied noun vigilia ("vigil"), the phrase nocturna vigilia ("nightly vigil"), and the phrases nocturna hora ("night hour) and nocturna laus ("nocturnal praise").

The practice of rising for prayer in the middle of the night is as old as the Church. Tertullian (c. 155 – c. 240) speaks of the "nocturnal convocations" (nocturnae convocationes) of Christians and their "absence all the night long at the paschal solemnities" (sollemnibus Paschae abnoctantes) Cyprian (c. 200 – 258) also speaks of praying at night, but not of doing so as a group: "Let there be no failure of prayers in the hours of night — no idle and reckless waste of the occasions of prayer" (nulla sint horis nocturnis precum damna, nulla orationum pigra et ignava dispendia). The Apostolic Tradition speaks of prayer at midnight and again at cockcrow, but seemingly as private, not communal, prayer. At an earlier date, Pliny the Younger reported in about 112 that Christians gathered on a certain day before light, sang hymns to Christ as to a god and shared a meal. The solemn celebration of vigils in the churches of Jerusalem in the early 380s is described in the Peregrinatio Aetheriae.

Prayer at midnight and at cockcrow was associated with passages in the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Mark. On the basis of the Gospel of Luke, too, prayer at any time of the night was seen as having eschatological significance.

The quotation from Tertullian above refers to the all-night vigil liturgy held at Easter. A similar liturgy came to be held in the night that led to any Sunday. By the fourth century this Sunday vigil had become a daily observance, but no longer lasted throughout the night. What had been an all-night vigil became a liturgy only from cockcrow to before dawn. Saint Benedict wrote about it as beginning at about 2 in the morning ("the eighth hour of the night") and ending in winter well before dawn (leaving an interval in which the monks were to devote themselves to study or meditation), but having to be curtailed in summer in order to celebrate lauds at daybreak.

Matins

The word matins is derived from the Latin adjective matutinus, meaning 'of or belonging to the morning'. It was at first applied to the psalms recited at dawn, but later became attached to the prayer originally offered, according to the fourth-century Apostolic Constitutions, at cockcrow and, according to the sixth-century Rule of Saint Benedict, at could be calculated to be the eighth hour of the night (the hour that began at about 2 a.m.).

Between the vigil office and the dawn office in the long winter nights there was an interval, which "should be spent in study by those [monks] who need a better knowledge of the Psalter or the lessons"; in the summer nights the interval was short, only enough for the monks to "go out for the necessities of nature". The vigil office was also shortened in the summer months by replacing readings with a passage of scripture recited by heart, but keeping the same number of psalms. Both in summer and in winter the vigil office was longer on Sunday than on other days, with more reading and the recitation of canticles in addition to the psalms.

Outside monasteries few rose at night to pray. The canonical hour of the vigil was said in the morning, followed immediately by lauds, and the name of "matins" became attached to the lengthier part of what was recited at that time of the day, while the name of "lauds", a name originally describing only the three Psalms 148−150 recited every day at the end of the dawn office (until excised in the 1911 reform of the Roman Breviary by Pope Pius X; see Lauds), was applied to the whole of that office, substituting for the lost name of "matins" or variants such as laudes matutinae (morning praises) and matutini hymni (morning hymns). An early instance of the application of the named "matins" to the vigil office is that of the Council of Tours in 567, which spoke of ad matutinum sex antiphonae.

The Rule of Saint Benedict clearly distinguished matins as the nighttime hour, to which he applied Psalm 118/119:62, "At midnight I rise to praise you, because of your righteous rules".

The word vigil also took on a different meaning: not only a prayerful night watch before a religious feast, but the day before a feast.

Monastic matins

The canonical hour began with the versicle "Lord, open our lips: And we shall praise your name" (the latter said three times) followed by Psalm 3 and Psalm 94/95 (the invitatory). The invitatory was to be recited slowly out of consideration for any late-arriving monk, since anyone appearing after its conclusion was punished by having to stand in a place apart. After this a hymn was sung.

Next came two sets of six psalms followed by readings. (Such sets would later be called nocturns.) The first set was of six psalms followed by three readings from the Old or New Testaments or from Church Fathers. Each reading was followed by a responsory. The second set of six psalms was followed by a passage from the Apostle Paul recited by heart and by some prayers. The Night Office then concluded with a versicle and a litany that began with Kyrie eleison.

Since summer nights are shorter, from Easter to October a single passage from the Old Testament, recited by heart, took the place of the three readings used during the rest of the year.

On Sundays, the office was longer, and therefore began a little earlier. Each set of six psalms was followed by four readings instead of three after the first set and a single recitation by heart after the second set. Then three canticles taken from Old Testament books other than the Psalms were recited, followed by four readings from the New Testament, the singing of the Te Deum, and a reading by the abbot from the Gospels, after which another hymn was sung.

Roman Breviary matins

In the Roman Breviary, use of which was made obligatory throughout the Latin Church (with exceptions for forms of the Liturgy of the Hours that could show they had been in continuous use for at least two hundred years) by Pope Pius V in 1568, matins and lauds were seen as a single canonical hour, with lauds as an appendage to matins.

Its matins began, as in the monastic matins, with versicles and the invitatory Psalm 94 (Psalm 95 in the Masoretic text) chanted or recited in the responsorial form, that is to say, by one or more cantors singing one verse, which the choir repeated as a response to the successive verses sung by the cantors. A hymn was then sung.

After that introduction, Sunday matins had three sections ("nocturns"), the first with 12 psalms and 3 very short scriptural readings; the second with 3 psalms and 3 equally short patristic readings; and the third with 3 psalms and 3 short extracts from a homily. Matins of feasts of double or semidouble rank had 3 nocturns, each with 3 psalms and 3 readings. On a feast of simple rank, a feria or a vigil day, matins had 12 psalms and 3 readings with no division into nocturns.

The psalms used at matins in the Roman Breviary from Sunday to Saturday were Psalms 1−108/109 in consecutive order, omitting a few that were reserved for other canonical hours: Psalms 4, 5, 21/22−25/26, 41/42, 50/51, 53/54, 62/63, 66/67, 89/90−92/93. The consecutive order was not observed for the invitatory psalms, recited every day, and in the matins of feasts.

Each reading was followed by a responsory, except the last one, when this was followed by the Te Deum.

20th-century changes

Matins underwent profound changes in the 20th century. The first of these changes was the reform of the Roman Breviary by Pope Pius X in 1911, resulting in what Pope Paul VI called "a new Breviary". The reservation of Psalms 1-108/109 to matins and the consecutive order within that group were abandoned, and, apart from the invitatory psalm, which continued in its place at matins every day, no psalm was ordinarily repeated within the same week. To facilitate an even distribution among the days of the week, the longer psalms were divided into shorter portions, as only the very long Psalm 118/119 had been previously. Matins no longer had 18 psalms on Sundays, 12 on ordinary days and 9 on the more important feasts: on every day it had 9 psalms, either distributed among three nocturns or recited all together, maintaining the distinction between celebrations as three nocturns with nine readings (including Sundays) and those arranged as a single nocturn with only three readings.

In 1947, Pope Pius XII entrusted an examination of the whole question of the Breviary to a commission which conducted a worldwide consultation of the Catholic bishops. He authorized recitation of the psalms in a new Latin translation and in 1955 ordered a simplification of the rubrics.

In 1960, Pope John XXIII issued his Code of Rubrics, which assigned nine readings only to matins on first-class and second-class feasts, and therefore reduced the readings at Sunday matins to three.

The Second Vatican Council's Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy dealt in some detail with the Divine Office, requesting that "the hour known as Matins" should become an office with fewer psalms and longer readings, suitable for nocturnal praise in a communal setting and for use at any time of the day in other cases. Subsequently in 1970, Pope Paul VI published a revised form of the Liturgy of the Hours, in which the psalms were arranged in a four-week instead of a one-week cycle, but the variety of other texts was greatly increased, in particular the scriptural and patristic readings, while the hagiographical readings were purged of non-historical legendary content. Matins was then given the name of "Office of Readings" (Officium lectionis) and was declared appropriate for celebrating at any hour, while preserving its nocturnal character for those who wished to celebrate a vigil. For that purpose alternative hymns are provided and an appendix contains material, in particular canticles and readings from the Gospels, to facilitate celebration of a vigil. The Catholic Church has thus restored to the word vigil the meaning it had in early Christianity. Pope John XIII's Code of Rubrics still used the word vigil to mean the day before a feast, but recognized the quite different character of the Easter Vigil, which, "since it is not a liturgical day, is celebrated in its own way, as a night watch". The Roman liturgy now uses the term vigil either in this sense of "a night watch" or with regard to a Mass celebrated in the evening before a feast, not before the hour of First Vespers.

The psalmody of the Office of Readings consists of three psalms or portions of psalms, each with its own antiphon. These are followed by two extended readings with their responsories, the first from the Bible (but not from the Gospels), and the second being patristic, hagiographical, or magisterial. A Gospel reading may optionally be added, preceded by vigil canticles, in order to celebrate a vigil. These are given in an appendix of the book of the Liturgy of the Hours.

To those who find it seriously difficult, because of their advanced age or for reasons peculiar to them, to observe the revised Liturgy of the Hours, Pope Paul VI gave permission to keep using the previous Roman Breviary either in whole or in part. In 2007 Pope Benedict XVI allowed all clergy of the Latin Church to fulfil their canonical obligations by using the 1961 Roman Breviary issued under Pope John XXIII (but not earlier editions such as that of Pius X or Pius V). This is done by traditionalist Catholic communities, such as the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter and the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest.

Non-Roman Western Rites

In the office of the Church of Jerusalem, of which the pilgrim Ætheria gives us a description, the vigils on Sundays terminated with the solemn reading of the Gospel, in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. This practice of reading the Gospel has been preserved in the Benedictine liturgy. In the Tridentine Roman Liturgy this custom, so ancient and so solemn, was no longer represented but by the Homily; but after the Second Vatican Council it has been restored for the celebration of vigils.

The Ambrosian Liturgy, better perhaps than any other, preserved traces of the great vigils or pannychides, with their complex and varied display of processions, psalmodies, etc. The same liturgy also preserved vigils of long psalmody. This nocturnal office adapted itself at a later period to a more modern form, approaching more and more closely to the Roman liturgy. Here too were found the three nocturns, with Antiphon, psalms, lessons, and responses, the ordinary elements of the Roman matins, and with a few special features quite Ambrosian.

As revised after the Second Vatican Council, the Ambrosian liturgy of the hours uses for what once called matins either the designation "the part of matins that precedes Lauds in the strict sense" or simply Office of Readings. Its structure is similar to that of the Roman Liturgy of the Hours, with variations such as having on Sundays three canticles, on Saturdays a canticle and two psalms, in place of the three psalms of the other days in the Ambrosian Rite and of every day in the Roman Rite.

In the Mozarabic liturgy, on the contrary, Matins is a system of antiphons, collects, and versicles which make them quite a departure from the Roman system.

Eastern Christianity

Byzantine Rite

In the Eastern Churches, matins is called orthros in Greek (ὄρθρος, meaning "early dawn" or "daybreak") and Oútrenya in Slavonic (Оўтреня). It is the last of the four night offices, which also include vespers, compline, and midnight office. In traditional monasteries it is celebrated daily so as to end at sunrise. In parishes it is normally served only on Sundays and feast days.

Matins is the longest and most complex of the daily cycle of liturgies. The akolouth (fixed portion of the liturgy) is composed primarily of psalms and litanies. The sequences (variable parts) of matins are composed primarily of hymns and canons from the Octoechos (an eight-tone cycle of hymns for each day of the week, covering eight weeks), and from the Menaion (hymns for each calendar day of the year).

Matins opens with what is called the "Royal Beginning", so called because the psalms (19 and 20) are attributed to King David and speak of the Messiah, the "king of kings"; in former times, the ektenia (litany) also mentioned the emperor by name. The Sunday orthros is the longest of the regular orthros liturgies. If celebrated in its entirety it can last up to three hours.

Oriental Christianity

Syriac Orthodox Church, Indian Orthodox Church and Mar Thoma Syrian Church

In the Syriac Orthodox Church and Indian Orthodox Church (both of which are Oriental Orthodox Churches), as well as the Mar Thoma Syrian Church (an Oriental Protestant denomination), the Midnight Office is known as Sapro and is prayed at 6 am using the Shehimo breviary.

Armenian Rite

In the Armenian liturgy of the hours, Matins is known as the Midnight Office (Armenian: ի մեջ գիշերի ""i mej gisheri""). The Armenian Book of Hours, or Zhamagirk` (Armenian: Ժամագիրք) states that the Midnight Office is celebrated in commemoration of God the Father.

Much of the liturgy consists of the kanon (Armenian: Կանոնագլուխ ""kanonagloukh""), consisting of a sequence of psalms, hymns, prayers, and in some instances readings from the Gospels, varying according to tone of the day, feast, or liturgical season. The Armenian kanon is quite different in form from the canon of the Byzantine matins liturgy, though both likely share a common ancestor in the pre-dawn worship of the Jerusalem liturgy.

Basic outline of Matins in the Armenian Church

Introduction (common to all liturgical hours): "Blessed is our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. Our father...Amen."

Fixed Preface

“Lord, if you open my lips, my mouth shall declare your praise.” (twice)

Acclamation: “Blessed is the consubstantial, unitary, and undivided Holy Trinity...Amen.

Psalms, Hebrew numbering in parentheses: 3, 88 (87), 103 (102), 143 (142)

“Glory to the Father...now and always...Amen”

Hymn of the Night Liturgy by Nerses Shnorhali: “Let us remember your name in the night, Lord...”

Proclamation by John Mandakuni “Having all been awakened in the night from the repose of sleep...”

“Lord, have mercy” (variable number of times: thrice for Sundays and feasts of Christ, 50 times for the feasts of saints, 100 times on days of fasting)

Hymn of Nerses Shnorhali: “All the world... (Ashkharh amenayn)”

“Lord, have mercy” (thrice). “Through the intercession of the Birthgiver of God: Remember, Lord, and have mercy.”

Hymn of Nerses Shnorhali: “The rising of the sun... (Aṛawowt lowsoy)”

Prayer: “We thank you...”

Blessed is our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. Alleluia, alleluia.

At this point a section of the Psalter is read, followed by a canticle from the Old or New Testament. See Armenian Liturgy. Following the Psalms and the Canticle is the Canon, a complex sequence of psalms, hymns, and prayers which varies in part according to the liturgical calendar.

Conclusion: "Our father...Amen."

The Armenian Matins or Midnight Office bears some resemblance with the Midnight office of the Byzantine Rite, such as the recitation of a movable set of hymns depending on the feast. However, the Armenian Midnight Office is generally more elaborate than the Byzantine Midnight Office, in that the Armenian counterpart includes readings from the Gospel, as well as cycles of psalms and prayers reflecting the liturgical season or feast. Other material in the Byzantine office of Matins which has a counterpart in the Armenian daily office, such as the recitation of large sections of the Psalter and the recitation of biblical canticles, occurs in the Armenian liturgy at the Sunrise Hour which follows Matins, corresponding to Lauds.

See also

• Liturgy of the Hours
• Canonical hours
• Diurnum
• Compline
• Vigil (liturgy)
• Matins in Lutheranism
• Anglican Morning Prayers
• Book of Hours

From the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia

Matins

I. Name

The word "Matins" (Lat. Matutinum or Matutinae), comes from Matuta, the Latin name for the Greek goddess Leucothae or Leucothea, white goddess, or goddess of the morning (Aurora): Leucothee graius, Matuta vocabere nostris, Ovid, V, 545. Hence Matutine, Matutinus, Matutinum tempus, or simply Matutinum (i.e. tempus); some of the old authors prefer Matutini Matutinorum, or Matutinae. In any case the primitive signification of the word under these different forms was Aurora, sunrise. It was at first applied to the office Lauds, which, as a matter of fact, was said at dawn (see LAUDS), its liturgical synonym being the word Gallicinium (cock-crow), which also designated this office. The night-office retained its name of Vigils, since, as a rule, Vigils and Matins (Lauds) were combined, the latter serving, to a certain extent, as the closing part of Vigils. The name Matins was then extended to the office of Vigils, Matins taking the name of Lauds, a term which, strictly speaking, only designates the last three psalms of that office, i.e. the "Laudate" psalms. At the time when this change of name took place, the custom of saying Vigils at night was observed scarcely anywhere but in monasteries, whilst elsewhere they were said in the morning, so that finally it did not seem a misapplication to give to a night Office a name which, strictly speaking, applied only to the office of day-break. The change, however, was only gradual. St. Benedict (sixth century) in his description of the Divine Office, always refers to Vigils as the Night Office, whilst that of day-break he calls Matins, Lauds being the last three psalms of that office (Regula, cap. XIII-XIV; see LAUDS). The Council of Tours in 567 had already applied the title "Matins" to the Night Office: ad Matutinum sex antiphonae; Laudes Matutinae; Matutini hymni are also found in various ancient authors as synonymous with Lauds. (Hefele-Leclercq, "Hist. des Conciles", V, III, 188, 189.)

II. Origin (Matins and Vigils)

The word Vigils, at first applied to the Night Office, also comes from a Latin source, both as to the term and its use, namely the Vigiliae or nocturnal watches or guards of the soldiers. The night from six o'clock in the evening to six o'clock in the morning was divided into four watches or vigils of three hours each, the first, the second, the third, and the fourth vigil. From the liturgical point of view and in its origin, the use of the term was very vague and elastic. Generally it designated the nightly meetings, synaxes, of the Christians. Under this form, the watch (Vigil) might be said to date back as early as the beginning of Christianity. It was either on account of the secrecy of their meetings, or because of some mystical idea which made the middle of the night the hour par excellence for prayer, in the words of the psalm: media nocte surgebam ad confitendum tibi, that the Christians chose the night time for their synaxes, and of all other nights, preferably the Sabbath. There is an allusion to it in the Acts of the Apostles (xx, 4), as also in the letter of Pliny the Younger. The liturgical services of these synaxes was composed of almost the same elements as that of the Jewish Synagogue: readings from the Books of the Law, singing of psalms, divers prayers. What gave them a Christian character was the fact that they were followed by the Eucharistic service, and that to the reading from the Law, the apostles and the Acts of the Apostles was very soon added, as well as the Gospels and sometimes other books which were non-canonical, as, for example, the Epistles of Saint Clement, that of Saint Barnabas, the Apocalypse of Saint Peter, etc.

The more solemn watches, which were held on the anniversaries of martyrs or on certain feasts, were also known by this title, especially during the third and fourth centuries. The Vigil in this case was also called pannychis, because the greater part of the night was devoted to it. Commenced in the evening, they only terminated the following morning, and comprised, in addition to the Eucharistic Supper, homilies, chants, and divers offices. These last Vigils it was that gave rise to certain abuses, and they were finally abolished in the Church (see VIGILS). Notwithstanding this, however, the Vigils, in their strictest sense of Divine Office of the Night, were maintained and developed. Among writers from the fourth to the sixth century we find several descriptions of them. The "De Virginitate", a fourth-century treatise, gives them as immediately following Lauds. The author, however, does not determine the number of psalms which had to be recited. Methodius in his "Banquet of Virgins" (Symposion sive Convivium decem Virginum) subdivided the Night Office or pannychis into watches, but it is difficult to determine what he meant by these nocturnes. St. Basil also gives a very vague description of the Night Office or Vigils, but in terms which permit us to conclude that the psalms were sung, sometimes by two choirs, and sometimes as responses. Cassian gives us a more detailed account of the Night Office of the fifth century monks. The number of psalms, which at first varied, was subsequently fixed at twelve, with the addition of a lesson from the Old and another from the New Testament. St. Jerome defended the Vigils against the attacks of Vigilantius, but it is principally concerning the watches at the Tombs of the Martyrs that he speaks in his treatise, "Contra Vigilantium". Of all the descriptions the most complete is that in the "Peregrinatio AEtheriae", the author of which assisted at Matins in the Churches of Jerusalem, where great solemnity was displayed. (For all these texts, see Bäumer-Biron, loc. cit., p. 79, 122, 139, 186, 208, 246, etc.) Other allusions are to be found in Caesaurius of Arles, Nicetiuis or Nicetae of Treves, and Gregory of Tours (see Baumer-Biron, loc. cit., I, 216, 227, 232).

III. The Elements of Matins from the Fourth to the Sixth Century

In all the authors we have quoted, the form of Night Prayers would appear to have varied a great deal. Nevertheless in these descriptions, and in spite of certain differences, we find the same elements repeated: the psalms generally chanted in the form of responses, that is to say by one or more cantors, the choir repeating one verse, which served as a response, alternately with the verses of psalms which were sung by the cantors; readings taken from the Old and the New Testament, and later on, from the works of the Fathers and doctors; litanies or supplications; prayer for the divers members of the Church, clergy, faithful, neophytes, and catechumens; for emperors; travellers; the sick; and generally for all the necessities of the Church, and even prayer for Jews and for heretics. [Baumer, Litanie u. Missal, in "Studien des Benediktinerordens", II (Raigern, 1886), 287, 289.] It is quite easy to find these essential elements in our modern Matins.

IV. Matins in the Roman and Other Liturgies

In the modern Roman Liturgy, Matins, on account of its length, the position it occupies, and the matter of which it is composed, may be considered as the most important office of the day, and for the variety and richness of its elements the most remarkable. It commences more solemnly than the other offices, with a psalm (Ps. xciv) called the Invitatory, which is chanted or recited in the form of a response, in accordance with the most ancient custom. The hymns, which have been but tardily admitted into the Roman Liturgy, as well as the hymns of the other hours, form part of a very ancient collection which, so far at least as some of them are concerned, may be said to pertain to the seventh or even to the sixth century. As a rule they suggest the symbolic signification of this Hour (see No. V), the prayer of the middle of the night. This principal form of the Office should be distinguished from the Office of Sunday, of Feasts, and the ferial or week day Office. The Sunday Office is made up of the invitatory, hymn, three nocturns, the first of which comprises twelve psalms, and the second and third three psalms each; nine lessons, three to each nocturn, each lesson except the ninth being followed by a response; and finally, the canticle Te Deum, which is recited or sung after the ninth lesson instead of a response. The Office of Feasts is similar to that of Sunday, except that there are only three psalms to the first nocturn instead of twelve. The week-day or ferial office and that of simple feasts are composed of one nocturn only, with twelve psalms and three lessons. The Office of the Dead and that of the three last days of Holy Week are simpler, the absolutions, benedictions, and invitatory being omitted, at least for the three last days of Holy Week, since the invitatory is said in the Offices of the Dead.

The principal characteristics of this office which distinguish it from all the other offices are as follows:

• The Psalms used at Matins are made up of a series commencing with Psalm i and running without intermission to Psalm cviii inclusive. The order of the Psalter is followed almost without interruption, except in the case of feasts, when the Psalms are chosen according to their signification, but always from the series i-cviii, the remaining Psalms being reserved for Vespers and the other Offices.

• The Lessons form a unique element, and in the other Offices give place to a Capitulum or short lesson. This latter has possibly been introduced only for the sake of symmetry, and in its present form, at any rate, gives but a very incomplete idea of what the true reading or lesson is. The Lessons of Matins on the contrary are readings in the proper sense of the term: they comprise the most important parts of the Old and the New Testament, extracts from the works of the principal doctors of the Church, and legends of the martyrs or of the other saints. The lessons from Holy Scripture are distributed in accordance with certain fixed rules (rubrics) which assign such or such books of the Bible to certain seasons of the year. In this manner extracts from all the Books of the Bible are read at the Office during the year. The idea, however, of having the whole Bible read in the Office, as proposed by several reformers of the Breviary, more especially during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, has never been regarded favourably by the Church, which views the Divine Office as a prayer and not as an object of study for the clergy.

• The Invitatory and, on certain days, the Finale or Te Deum also form one of the principal characteristics of this Office.

• The Responses, more numerous in this Office, recall the most ancient form of psalmody; that of the psalm chanted by one alone and answered by the whole choir, as opposed to the antiphonic form, which consists in two choirs alternately reciting the psalms.

• The division into three or two Nocturns is also a special feature of Matins, but it is impossible to say why it has been thought by some to be a souvenir of the military watches (there were not three, but four, watches) or even of the ancient Vigils, since ordinarily there was but one meeting in the middle of the night. The custom of rising three times for prayer could only have been in vogue, as exceptional, in certain monasteries, or for some of the more solemn feasts (see Nocturns).

• In the Office of the Church of Jerusalem, of which the pilgrim Ætheria gives us a description, the Vigils on Sundays terminate with the solemn reading of the Gospel, in the Grotto of the Holy Sepulchre. This practice of reading the Gospel has been preserved in the Benedictine Liturgy. It is a matter for regret that in the Roman Liturgy this custom, so ancient and so solemn, is no longer represented but by the Homily.

The Ambrosian Liturgy, better perhaps than any other, has preserved traces of the great Vigils or pannychides, with their complex and varied display of processions, psalmodies, etc. (cf. Dom Cagin; "Paleographie Musicale", vol. VI, p. 8, sq.; Paul Lejay; Ambrosien (rit.) in "Dictionnaire d'Archeol. Chret. et de Liturgie", vol. I, p. 1423 sq.). The same Liturgy has also preserved Vigils of long psalmody. This Nocturnal Office adapted itself at a later period to a more modern form, approaching more and more closely to the Roman Liturgy. Here too are found the three Nocturns, with Antiphon, Psalms, Lessons, and Responses, the ordinary elements of the Roman Matins, and with a few special features quite Ambrosian. In the Benedictine Office, Matins, like the text of the Office, follows the Roman Liturgy quite closely. The number of psalms, viz. twelve, is always the same, there being three or two Nocturns according to the degree of solemnity of the particular Office celebrated. Ordinarily there are four Lessons, followed by their responses, to each Nocturn. The two most characteristic features of the Benedictine Matins are: the Canticles of the third Nocturn, which are not found in the Roman Liturgy, and the Gospel, which is sung solemnly at the end, the latter trait, as already pointed out, being very ancient. In the Mozarabic Liturgy (q.v.), on the contrary, Matins are made up of a system of Antiphons, Collects, and Versicles which make them quite a departure from the Roman system.

V. Signification and Symbolism

From the foregoing it is clear that Matins remains the principal Office of the Church, and the one which, in its origin, dates back the farthest, as far as the Apostolic ages, as far even as the very inception of the Church. It is doubtless, after having passed through a great many transformations, the ancient Night Office, the Office of the Vigil. In a certain sense it is, perhaps, the Office which was primitively the preparation for the Mass, that is to say, the Mass of the Catechumens, which presents at any rate the same construction as that Office:—the reading from the Old Testament, then the epistles and the Acts, and finally the Gospel—the whole being intermingled with psalmody, and terminated by the Homily (cf. Cabrol: "Les Origines Liturgiques", Paris, 1906, 334 seq.). If for a time this Office appeared to be secondary to that of Lauds or Morning Office, it is because the latter, originally but a part of Matins, drew to itself the solemnity, probably on account of the hour at which it was celebrated, permitting all the faithful to be present. According to another theory suggested by the testimony of Lactantius, St. Jerome, and St. Isidore, the Christians, being ignorant of the date of Christ's coming, thought He would return during the middle of the night, and most probably the night of Holy Saturday or Easter Sunday, at or about the hour when He arose from the sepulchre. Hence the importance of the Easter Vigil, which would thus have become the model or prototype of the other Saturday Vigils, and incidentally of all the nightly Vigils. The idea of the Second Advent would have given rise to the Easter Vigil, and the latter to the office of the Saturday Vigil (Batiffol, "Hist. du Bréviaire", 3). The institution of the Saturday Vigil would consequently be as ancient as that of Sunday.

BONA, De Divina Psalmodia in Opera Omnia (Antwerp, 1677), 693 sq.; GRANCOLAS, Commentarius historicus in Rom. Breviar., 100; PROBST, Brevier und Breviergebet (Tubingen, 1854), 143 sq.; BAUMER, Histoire du Breviaire, tr. BIRON, I (Paris, 1905), 60 sq.; DUCHESNE, Christian Worship (1904), 448, 449; BATIFFOL, Histoire du Breviaire, 3 sq.; THALHOFER, Handbuch der Katholischen Liturgik, II, 434, 450; GASTOUE, Les Vigiles Nocturnes (Paris, 1908) (Collection Bloud); see HOURS (CANONICAL); LAUDS; VIGILS; BREVIARY.

External links

• "Matins". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 17 (11th ed.). 1911.
• Sunday Orthos Greek Orthodox Church in America
• Daily Matins Russian Orthodox (in English)
• Byzantine Catholic Daily Prayer
• The Office of Readings for today's date (Roman Catholic)